The Way I See It is a blog published at least three times a week containing thoughts and analysis and irreverent musings on the local, state, and national sports world.

College basketball season takes over for college football

About this blog

By Dennis Miller

My name is Dennis Miller and I am a lifelong resident of Kirksville, MO. I have been totally blind since birth and a sports fanatic just as long. I like all sports but love baseball and am a proud lifelong member of Cardinal Nation. It is my honor
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My name is Dennis Miller and I am a lifelong resident of Kirksville, MO. I have been totally blind since birth and a sports fanatic just as long. I like all sports but love baseball and am a proud lifelong member of Cardinal Nation. It is my honor to be given the opportunity to write a blog for the Kirksville Daily Express and I hope you enjoy reading it as much as I enjoy writing it.

Tomorrow marks the first Saturday in three months without college football, whatever will we do? Actually, the annual Army/Navy football game it tomorrow for those who are really desperate. It also means that college basketball is front and center for the first Saturday since early last spring.

The Truman State men’s and women’s basketball teams have a home double header against Missouri Southern on Saturday at Pershing Arena. The women lost a tough one on Wednesday night to MO Western while the men were able to pick up their first conference win of the season and continue on the winning track. MO Southern always has good teams so it will be an excellent opportunity to see some outstanding college basketball.

The Missouri Tigers men’s basketball team plays Tennessee State on Saturday in one of their last easy games before the schedule gets much tougher. As I mentioned in Wednesday’s blog the Tigers didn’t play especially well on Tuesday night so I think it is important to look impressive on Saturday. Things get much tougher from here on out.

The Tiger Classic high school wrestling tournament takes place in Kirksville on Friday and Saturday. This is one of the better tournaments in the state in my opinion and will be an excellent opportunity to see our Tigers against some of the top teams in the state. Get out and see some excellent wrestling action this weekend.

College football may be over but the NFL isn’t and both the Kansas City Chiefs and St. Louis Rams are on the road this weekend. The Chiefs are in Cleveland to take on the Browns while the Rams travel to Buffalo to take on the Bills. The Browns have been playing pretty well recently and are coming off a big victory last Sunday. The Chiefs are still a huge mystery and it will be interesting to see how they play this week after putting everything together last Sunday in the face of incredibly odds to beat the Bengals. Brady Quinn played with a confidence he hasn’t had for the past several years so it is possible that last week’s game was a watershed moment for the Chiefs and they have turned the corner. It is also possible they will return to the Chiefs of old which doesn’t bode well for them against any NFL team.

The Rams play a team in the Bills who have been up and down this season. The Bills have the ability to score a lot of points but they also have the ability to give up a lot of points as well. The Rams considence level should be pretty high after defeating the 49ers last week so hopefully the Rams can come away with a victory. They still have an outside shot of making the playoffs but cannot lose any more games.

The St. Louis Cardinals came away from baseball’s winter meetings earlier this week with precisely what they needed to improve the left side of the bullpen adding lefthanded specialist Rant Choate who is one of the best specialists in the game and is coming off a very good year with the Marlins and Dodgers. I’m very surprised the Dodgers didn’t make more of an effort to resign him but their loss is the Cardinals gain.

We’ll be back on Monday with a review of all this weekend’s sports action and a look ahead to what is coming up next week. Please make an effort to get out and support our local athletes over the weekend. Thanks as always for your continued support of this and all the other blogs on this site.